Refrigerator



Inventor:

March 24, 1942. 1.. w. ATCHISON REFRIGERATOR Filed Nov. 1, 1939 Leonard W. Atc zhison,

a I l-lis Attorney.

Q Patented-Mar. 24, 1942 REFRIGERATOR Leonard w. Atchison, Schenectady, N. Y., assignor to General Electric Company, a corporation or New York Application November 1, 1939, Serial No. 302,388

3Claims.

My invention relates to refrigerators, and particularly to refrigerators of the type in which a compartment is cooled by a cooling element arranged in theupper portion thereof in order to produce a natural circulation of air.

It is a common practice to construct household refrigerating machines with food compartments cooled by evaporators arranged in the upper portion of. the compartments so that the natural tendency of cold air to circulate downward may be employed to maintain a circulation of airthroughout the compartment to be cooled. The.

arrangement of the cooling unit in the .top of the compartment tends to cool the upper portion of the inner cabinet walls or liner near the evaporator and to maintain that portion at a lower tern-- perature than other portions thereof. This is particularly true in mechanical refrigerators provided with motor-compressor units arranged directly below the compartment to be cooled, since a portion of the heat from the refrigerating machine passes upwardly through the insulation in the bottom wall of the cabinet. It sometimesbezcomes desirable" to prevent uneven distribution of temperatures throughout the cabinet liner, and particularly to prevent the passage of heat through the bottom ofthe cabinet directly to articles placed on the bottom wall of the food compartment formed by the cabinet liner. For

example, it is a frequent practice to support containers adapted to hold vegetables and similar foods on the bottom wall of the food compartment. These containers are adapted to prevent any substantial dehydration of the articles contained therein. When such containers are placed on the bottom wall, it may happen that the rewhich characterize my invention will be pointed out with particularity in the claims annexed to and forming a part of this specification.

For a better understanding of my invention, reference may be had to the accompanying drawing in which Fig. 1 is a perspective view of a Accordingly, it is an household refrigerator embodying my invention; Fig. 2 is a sectional side elevation view of aportion of the refrigerator shown in Fig. 1; and Fig. 3 is an enlargedsectional view of a portion of the cabinet wall on the lines 3-8 of Fig. 2.

Referring now to the drawing, in Fig. 1 I have shown a refrigerator having a thermally insulated cabinet Ill and a food compartment H to which accessmay be gained by opening a door II. The compartment II is arranged to be cooled by a cooling element or evaporator l3 which is connected in the refrigerant circuit of a refrigerating .machine including .a motor-compressor unit It arranged'in a machinery compartment within the cabinet l0 below the compartment l-l. Access 1 to the machinery compartment may be had by removing a panel l5. Therefrigerant circuit and connections between the unit It and evaporator l3 havebeen omitted from the drawing for purposes of clarity. A plurality of grille-like shelves 16 are provided in the food compartment 'to support articles to be cooled while permitting the air to circulate therearound.

During'the operation of the refrigerating machine, the air at the top of the compartment II is cooled by the evaporator l3 and circulated downwardly, the warmer air in the lower portion of the cabinet rising to take its place, the circulating air absorbing heat from the articles within the cabinet and 'on the shelves l6.

As shown in Fig. 2, the cabinet Hi includes an outer 'metal casing l1 and a liner I8 of metal or other suitable material forming the sides and top and bottom walls of'the food compartment II. The space between the casing I] and liner 18 is filled with heat insulating material l9 to minimize the transfer of heat to the food compartment. Since the evaporator 13 is-arranged in close proximity to an upper side wall of the liner l8, it tends to maintain that portion at a lower temperature than the bottom wall. In a household refrigerator, it is frequently desirable to place closed containers on the. bottom of the food compartment for maintaining high relative humidity therein to prevent dehydration 'of certain foods such as vegetables. In Fig. 2, I have shown a container 20 having a lid -2l and provided for this purpose. It is obvious that there is a limited circulation of air around the container 20 and there is, therefore, less cooling capacity available to absorb heat entering the food compartment through the bottom wall thereof. It is, therefore, desirable to provide some arrangement for lowering the temperature of the lower portion of the liner I8. I have found that 

